the rest of their journey to St. Helena. Though if that ship carried her enemy, it wouldn’t matter if the Belonging was docked at the island.
St. Helena was a thriving port, but it wasn’t England. Sarani wouldn’t be able to hide there, not for long anyway. Rubbing clammy palms on her trousers, she almost jumped out of her skin when a large shadow loomed beside her. Her kukri blades were in her hands before she recognized the man.
The duke’s laconic quartermaster.
“Planning to gut me from navel to nose, Princess?” Gideon asked.
She tucked the weapons back into their sheaths. Gideon was huge. She doubted she could reach his chin even with the tip of her blade. He looked like many of the men from her homeland, with rich dark brown skin that gleamed in the sun, but his huge height and blue eyes made her wonder if he was mixed with some kind of Nordic Viking. His bald head was shiny and dotted with sweat.
“No, and don’t call me that.”
“Why?” the large man said. “You are a princess. Pretending you are not serves no purpose.”
It does when people want you dead.
“Regardless, it’s just Sara now. Did Asha return to the cabin?”
“No, she wanted to watch the sunset.”
Sarani turned her head to where Asha sat cross-legged on the deck, her lips rolled between her teeth, and stared out to sea. She’d just finished playing the shehnai and was now focused on the glimmering ocean.
The maid looked up, her eyes caught on the sky, her jaw sagging with wonder. “It looks like Joor,” she said.
Sarani felt something tug on her heart, her eyes flicking to the sunset. It did look a little like Joor. An explosion of red, orange, and gold, like the sky was on fire. The slightest hint of a storm blackened the edges, adding an unusual depth to the striations of color. She drew a ragged breath, letting nature’s beauty sink in for a scant moment, though the anxious pressure in her breast didn’t abate.
By her count, they had a week left to get to the coaling port at St. Helena. She’d overheard Gideon saying that they’d caught some favorable winds, which had cut the journey short a few days, and the captain’s judicious use of his steam propellers had helped. However, if that shadow of a ship caught up to them, she knew she would be bringing trouble to Rhystan and his men. She had to know what that ship meant, and what better time than the present to ask the man who could give her answers.
“Is that vessel following us?” she asked Gideon, sidling over to him.
Unreadable eyes met hers. “Why?”
“Rhystan, er, the captain said something the other day, that it might be the navy.”
“Perhaps.”
Sarani waited, but nothing more was forthcoming. She resisted the urge to kick the unhelpful giant in the shins. “Are you expecting trouble?”
“It’s not for you to worry about.”
Oh, you have no idea, you big, uncooperative lump.
She sensed she wasn’t going to get anything out of him, at least not about that ship. Or anything about this ship. Or Rhystan, or why the British navy could possibly be tracking them. Or any useful information at all. Her eyes narrowed with sudden suspicion, recalling the crates in the hold that were sectioned off and padlocked.
“What cargo does the Belonging carry?”
Gideon grunted. “What?”
“If this isn’t a passenger ship, what does it carry?”
The man had the audacity to smile, or offer what passed for a smile anyway. It was more of a grimace on that taciturn face. Sarani knew that whatever he was going to say was going to aggravate her even further. She wasn’t wrong. “Ask the captain.”
“Fine, I will.”
Knowing Asha was safe with the ogre, even though Sarani wanted to kick him in his truculent shins, she decided to make her way down into the hold. Not to see the crates in question and assuage her curiosity but to feed the livestock and clean out the paddock. Anything would be better than thinking about what that ship on the horizon meant. Even shoveling piles upon piles of smelly dung.
She should have known Vikram wouldn’t let her go so easily, not when he’d murdered a maharaja without a qualm. Sarani feared for Asha’s family and the rest of her handmaidens—she hoped they were safe—and she worried for her people because Vikram would be looking out for himself, not them. Her father, for all his faults and concessions to the crown, had tried to keep Joor’s interests